National Sports Day 2020: History, significance, celebration

National Sports Day is celebrated on August 29 every year to honour the hockey legend, Major Dhyan Chand. The Government of India has decided to celebrate his birthday as the National Sports Day since 2012.

Union Minister of Youth Affairs and Sports Kiren Rijiju will pay tribute to Major Dhyan Chand at Dhyan Chand Stadium in New Delhi on his birth anniversary.

Due to Covid-19 pandemic, this year President Ram Nath Kovind will give National Sports and Adventure Awards virtually on National Sports Day on August 29. Kiren Rijiju, Narendra Dhruv Batra—President of the Indian Olympic Association and other dignitaries will attend the ceremony from Vigyan Bhavan, New Delhi.

Major Dhyan Chand, the greatest hockey player of India won three Olympic gold medals. At the Berlin Olympic Games in 1936, Dhyan Chand was appointed as the captain of the Indian Hockey team. Dhyan Chand had scored more than 400 international goals in his international career from 1926 to 1948. He was awarded Padma Bhushan, the third-highest civilian honour in the year 1956 by Government of India.

Major Dhyan Chand Singh came to be known as ‘Wizard of Hockey’, worldwide. He was born on August 29, 1905, at Allahabad (now Prayagraj) in Uttar Pradesh. He joined the Indian army as a soldier in 1922.